What is Inter-Process Communication

One of the promises of Grid Computing is to enable the execution of applications across multiple sites. Several multi-site applications require simultaneous access to resources hosted on autonomous domains; this problem is known as resource co-allocation. Projects working on resource co-allocation face four major problems: distributed transactions, fault tolerance, inter-site network overhead, and schedule optimization. Although resource co-allocation is fundamental for Grid Computing, no survey has covered the current projects, solutions, and open challenges on this topic. Therefore, in this chapter, the authors describe the challenges on resource co-allocation, present the projects developed over the last decade, and classify them according to their similar characteristics. In addition, the authors discuss open research issues and trends such as negotiation, advance reservations, and rescheduling of multi-site applications.